


Your Finery is Secret

by Affectionary



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Conversations about Murder, Erik Satie, Graphic Description of Corpses, Irony, M/M, Operas, not sure how graphic it is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-18
Updated: 2019-11-18
Packaged: 2021-02-08 13:27:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21476746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Affectionary/pseuds/Affectionary
Summary: The disagreement had gotten out of hand, and this is the result he is to endure.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13
Collections: Mind The Age Gap Flash Fic Prompt Meme





	Your Finery is Secret

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [RedLink](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedLink/pseuds/RedLink) in the [agegapflashficpromptmeme](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/agegapflashficpromptmeme) collection. 

> Prompt is in the end notes.
> 
> I'd recommend listening to Erik Satie while reading, Ludions or Gymnopédies or Gnossiennes. Ludions is most relevant, but I listened to all of them while writing. 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTCC3IN4_Mc  
A link to Ludions. 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WNCBPdetG4  
A link to the first three of Gymnopédies.  
  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7kvGqiJC4g  
Gnossiennes

The steam he blew off seems to recondense in the warm, and lushly furnished office. The sofa's arm that his hand presses down upon, brims with telemetric stress, squeezed for comfort. Patients come to the Doctor, for all sorts of reasons, for comfort, for advice, for introspection, for clarity. Those reasons hit him on ricochet. It was like being inside a heart: all that was circulating would end up coming back around. 

"It was all noise. A failed attempt at obliteration." 

What the hell is Will supposed to get from that? The body was beaten convex, blood and bone and guts poured into a mould of a former man. The senseless destruction was meant to be something, but it left a hollow. 

They had their unreliable witnesses, and those witnesses could agree that it was a man at least, they had a wide, wide pool of suspects, and they're finding enough for the forensic teams to start finding other forensic teams. And Will Graham had nothing to give.

Dr. Lecter looked at him like he wanted nothing. 

So Will said something. "He's a novice." It pissed him off.

It was really pure luck, that he didn't leave much DNA, or that the corpse of his making would so obscure any particulate's use. It was common sense to steal the money, and not the credit cards, but leaving the ID? There was speculation that it might have been an act of remorse, Will explains, but what if the killer simply doesn't care, the victim's identity has no relevance to his own identity. 

Dr. Lecter listens, thinking on it. His thoughts are at the floor along Will's outsole, but his thoughts always land near Will's eyes. He thinks with his lips neat and tight, careful before he speaks. 

He makes Will feel so careless.

"So you know it's his first?"

"It was impulsive. It was angry. This isn't an everyday type thing for him, else we'd be noticing a lot more of these pulps. It was clumsy, and unprepared, and so very angry. The victim didn't die as soon as he was stoned."

It doesn't matter whether they were alive or dead. The action is more important than the consequences. Will finds it hard to relate to that kind of callousness.

Dr. Lecter rephrases, "It's his latest then."

"It's his only, so far. I know there isn't much for forensics to get, but that doesn't mean I can divine it either. What's there to glean? It's a brute having found a rock and a victim."

"Nonetheless, Jack is hoping you'll find something."

"He'll learn how to experience disappointment like the rest of us."

"And what is your disappointment?"

Will isn't sure. Disappointed in the rock he's received? Disappointed in people? Disappointed in himself? How about all of the above.

There is a gentle touch to his shoulder. Will allows himself a single, dejected sigh.

"And Jack?"

Jack, whom invites him to all the messes, for the hell of it, into the hell of it? "He's grasping at straws. And I'm tired of being grasped for every little thing!"  
  
His strident tone scares the hand away. That's what Will does. He reasserts his nature. 

"I should know better."

"Do you think Jack will finally be grateful to you? What will you do when this doesn't earn it?"

He already knows Jack is, but. It sure doesn't feel like it.

Hannibal brushes his knuckles underneath Will's chin, encouraging him to look at him.

The rest of his dejected sighs will be for when he can't sleep, to exhale this quiet, sympathetic atmosphere into tangibility.

"How does he feel when he is not getting what he wants?"

Will looks into stained glass that lets no light in.

"Like he'll have to do it all over again."

Hannibal should have gloves on those hands, if he intends to keep them on Will, so that they don't end up covered in blood.

"Do you really believe this is the first time he's ever killed?"

Will Graham laughs, and blatantly disagrees with what the Doctor is implying. 

"Okay, I'll bite." 

Dr. Lecter shouldn't smile like that when someone is doubting him. 

"He was frustrated by the ineffectiveness of killing, so he murdered someone to see his rage actualized. And his rage made a bloody crater."

Will is attempting to attain their motive, but it's so ethereal as to be nonexistent. He was killing for a fairytale, but when magic didn't happen, he killed for a satisfaction he would never feel?

"You are the profiler."

"Lecter, if you have this guy's number, you're welcome to share it with me. You're an experienced, respected psychiatrist. I trust your opinion."

Hannibal holds a conductor's pause. Thoughtful, but unhaunted.

"If it was his first time, he would have been even clumsier. He must already have long noted behavioral issues, and a history of violent acts, although, none quite like this. What prompted such an escalation?" 

How would he have been clumsier? He ran off with a rock in his goddamn arms. Sightings of this phantom have been alleged, and corroborated. 

"Anything, everything. Living is hard. I don't disagree with you entirely," Although, he does enjoy disagreeing with Dr. Lecter, "And we both think he's sane, or else we'd both be discussing delusions and psychosis."

The killer was aware of reality, but not in control of his emotions.

"But why would he have killed before? Frustration, dissatisfaction, mindless anger drives him to kill this time. But frustration and all that can come from anything."

"So why murder?"

"Because just as murder can be a one-of-a-kind confluence of circumstances, it often also belies further blood and bodies."

Will wants a positive, a certainty. He is adrift in this baseless, unanchored noise. 

"I don't want to understand him," Will suggests. He bores, and disgusts Will. 

"Yet you keep trying to."

Will groans. It won't leave him, one way or another. 

"If you still disagree with me, and would like to take your mind off of it, listen to _Ludions_ with me. I promise it won't be noise."

"Music therapy?" He already listens to Lecter's voice.

"Something like that."

Dr. Lecter should stop inviting Will to places. 

He notified Dr. Lecter that he didn't have any formal jackets to wear. He feels like a cheap rat arriving at the Lyric Opera House. When Lecter finds him, he helps him into one of his own. It's plain and black, and the shoulders are sharper than his own. He looks formal, but still uncomfortable.

Will Graham does not belong in these places. 

The disagreement had gotten out of hand, and this is the result he is to endure.

Will awkwardly follows Dr. Lecter. At the moment, it feels more like "therapy" than "music." And Will would reject the arm of Hannibal, if he could, but he navigates so seamlessly through the expansive concert hall that he would be lost without him.

Hannibal has precious metal wristlinks. Silver and ruby, for a tame and tapered tangerine oversuit, a slate undershirt, a sunrise tie. He really does expect the opera gloves, but no.

"Satie's _Ludions_ are brief, and not the majority of the performance, but I think they will stick with you."

He holds Will bare-handed, no gloves, as he leads them to their seats. 

"It's polite to remain quiet until the end," Hannibal instructs. Will can hear why. The floor tremors with that polite mouthful.

The last thing Will says is, "I'll survive without your conversation." 

The auditorium hushed, and it dimmed. The darkness was a kind of light. A kind of light that beckoned light.

Hannibal is muted, but animated. This is the most expressive he has ever seen Hannibal. The human flush of celebration, the elegant gloom that overtakes his countenance, the sincerity with which he beholds the music. Will can't understand the singing, but he can understand the stories by Hannibal's expressions alone. 

He taps his wrist when _Ludions_ come on. This is what Hannibal thought Will would enjoy.

They're much more amusing than Will would have assumed. A specific emotion contained within each melody, and there is no anger. He closes his eyes.

The chord's reverberations had an interesting time measure, in that time, the man had reformed beside Will. He was silent, polite to not interrupt; he and Will could talk after.

Satie set his dear friend's poetry to music, rearranging the order of the poems to give it a more buoyant, happy end. The romantic melancholy is practically erased by _Chanson du chat_.

Will Graham knows this feeling will end unpleasantly for both of them, but Hannibal encourages it as he introduces Will to his _demimonde_. And this was taking his mind off of it. 

**Author's Note:**

> **Prompt:**
> 
> I would love a softer take than canon on the power imbalance between Will and Hannibal.  
Situations where Hannibal is taking the lead, getting Will to come to a dinner party or to the opera, or lecturing him on a culture related case, etc. Will getting indignant and rebellious but eventually surrending to Hannibal (and being secretly a little awed by the man).  
I know this is very vague, honestly you can take all the liberties you want with this prompt, I just want to read some Hannigram and will eternally worship whoever claims this.


End file.
